Over the years we have seen a lot of actors turn down a lot of big roles in some very impressive movies and it seems that Hollywood superstar Nicolas Cage has turned down more than his fair share of big movie roles over the years. Nicolas has rejected a lot of impressive roles in big movies during his career and here we take a quick look at a few of them.

Keanu Reeves took over as Neo

As most of you will probably already know by now, Hollywood actor Will Smith rejected the role of Neo in the hit movie The Matrix, as he wanted to go and make the film Wild Wild West. Good choice Will. But what many of you may not know is that Nicolas Cage also turned down the role, before Keanu Reeves was eventually cast. Nicolas chose to reject the role in The Matrix as it meant spending too much time away from his family, since filming would take place in Australia.

One of the funniest movies that has ever been released would have to be the film Dumb and Dumber and, while Jim Carrey was always first choice to play the role of Lloyd, it seems that Jeff Daniels was not always in line for the role of Harry. It is claimed that Jim Carrey wanted to work with Nicolas Cage and saw Dumb and Dumber as the ideal project but Nicolas chose to reject the role and instead went off to make the movie Leaving Las Vegas, which bagged him the Best Actor Oscar.

Viggo Mortensen played Aragon

When it comes to the huge success of The Lord of the Rings movies, it is fair to say that one of the best performances in the films comes from Viggo Mortensen as Aragon, although he was not first choice for the role. Nicolas Cage was in talks to play Aragon on The Lord of the Rings but, as with The Matrix, it would have meant spending too much time away from his family, with The Lord of the Rings filming in New Zealand. Stuart Townsend was then cast in the role, before being sacked and replaced by Viggo Mortensen.

There are plenty more big roles that we could have seen Nicolas Cage in over the years, with the biggest and most famous of them all being as Superman in the planned Tim Burton movie Superman Lives. While we all know that Nicolas Cage is a more than capable actor, we have to admit that we are pleased that he did not take on any of these roles.